I'm Not Okay
by pariahpirate
Summary: When you meet the Primarchs... vice becomes strength for the price of your virtue. You choose how steep, but it never seems to matter. The Primarchs always win. Fufill the contract to regain what was lost ... or die trying. AU


**Um... here?**

I'm (Not) Okay

Led through never ending halls of white doors and hollow-faced patients, silent and shuffling and dead-eyed, she whispers to herself, I'm okay, I'm okay... Because she doesn't want to be one of them.

"It's okay.", her tour guide tells her, flashing her the ghost of a smirk, as if he's faking emotion. She shivers when she recalls where, exactly, she is. How that could be the case, easily. How truly afraid she really is.

"I don't want to be here." She confesses, her voice shrill in the tight grip of fear, "I don't belong here!"

Her guide's face is a blemish-less mask as he turns completely to face her. His darker skin has a greyish tinge, as if he hasn't seen the sun in years. It's scary. It's fact. He looks up with unfeeling eyes, cold and dark, like the empty room he shoves her into. And then he smiles.

It's a smile that could frighten the blind.

"Don't you?" He asks, and his eerie demeanor is tearing at her ragged nerves. She's shaking on the cold tile within the thin white garb she was issued upon arrival. Her guide stands above her, a dark spectre in greying fabric. He smiles still, but there's a harshness in his eyes, a sadistic glimmer.

"No I don't!" She screams, pristine nails integrity forgotten as she claws at the floor. "Oh," the boy laughs and it's the most chilling thing the girl has ever heard, "But I think you do, honey!"

And he closes the door. The metallic click of the lock is as deafening as it is shattering. She screams. She begs. She bangs on the door.

Nobody comes.

-:-

"Hello!"

Time has escaped her grasps. Her throat is raw. The room is suffocatingly small, but the thick strong door is open, and a model-worthy sylph stands on its threshold. She narrows her eyes and smirks. She can take her. She's not too scary; she doesn't look too tough.

"Noah said you'd attack me!" She chirps, flipping her long blond hair behind her. She laughs like the idea is impossible. It isn't. "I didn't believe him! He's always such a meanie-downer!" She blabbers on about things that she don't understand nor care about. She makes no sense. At all.

"Aaaanywaaaays~" Her visitor drags out the word and she suppresses a snarl. That is one of her many pet peeves, but she has to play nice now. This idiot bombshell could be her ticket to freedom. Her chance to escape.

"You're not getting out!"

The stir-crazed schemer freezes. She speaks for the first time in a long while. Her voice is rough and weak from disuse.

"How-" She begins. She cannot finish. She finds her face buried within the scratchy off-white hospital clothing that covers the newcomer's generous chest. It's highly uncomfortable.

"Poor baby!" The airheaded girl cries, "Don't worry! All you have to do is Wake up!" She releases a disheveled and confused prisoner.

"Wake...up?" She repeats slowly. The curvy blonde grins and nods enthusiastically, "Yup!"

"H- how?"

A strange look fogs over her crystal blue eyes. There's something she can't quite place in the smile on the other girl's face.

"To Wake up, you have to sleep!"

And the blonde leaves. And then she is alone again.

-:-

"I don't belong here."

"Of course you do! Now eat your food."

"No. I don't belong here."

"... Do you know why you're here?"

"Because my parents think I'm crazy!"

"Try again."

"Because I'm a 'danger to myself'!"

"Nope."

"To keep me in! To keep me away from the rest of the world! ... To protect them from me..."

"Close, but no cigar."

"Then why am I here? Tell me, oh Wise Warden!"

"First- do you really believe you're a danger to the world?"

"No!"

"Then why mention that?"

"Because that's why I'm here! For some bullshit reason! I don't belong here!"

"No. Courtney... Courtney, you do belong here. But it's not to keep the world safe from you. It's to keep you safe from the world."

"Wha-?"

"I'm not telling. It's your job to find out. So go. Sleep. Wake up. Become ready- and then you can leave."

-:-

Her fourth visitor is a gangly teen with tanned skin and a gap-toothed grin. He's rather tall, but there's a shyness to him that causes a slouch. He looks familiar.

"I know nobody's really explained anything to you. I'm really not supposed to- but I wish that wasn't a rule. It could've saved a lot of pain."

He closes the door behind him and she watches from the bed. "I'm Mike." He says, holding out his hand.

"Courtney." She replies briskly, her face impassive. Mike drops his unshaken hand. He seems unaffected by her coldness, and sits on the edge of her bed.

"When you Wake up- you'll meet the Primarchs. They'll offer you a deal." Mike's fists clench the fabric of his pants. His knuckles turn white. "They'll offer you power," He says, "Of equal proportions to that of what you give up." He looks her in the eye and there is so much emotion. So much. So much.

"To get power, you have to trade something away. My little brother- he-" Mike breaks the sentence and bows his head. "Just... Just be careful what you give away. The price is steep."

"Are you 'awake'?" Courtney presses, curiosity piqued.

"Yes." Mike responds bitterly, "And it's awful. My price wasn't even that high." A hysterical laugh bubbles forth. "And I just signed away my body to house a bunch of ghosts I can barely control."

Courtney must have looked startled.

"What did you think I meant by powers?" He tries to joke. "What other powers exist?" Her question is authoritative and fierce. Mike flinches, beneath her tone or gaze she does not know, but he flinches all the same. "All sorts- invincibility, immortality, telekinesis, inhuman strength, speed- you name it." He pauses to wet his dry lips. "The Primarchs know our worst quality, and morph it into an ability, for the price of best quality. That's how it goes."

"Don't- don't give up everything. That's- what _he_ did. And if he could... he'd regret every moment."

"Who?" Courtney pries again, but this time, gentler.

"My little brother." Mike whispers, and she can see the crystal tears slide down the dark cheeks. Even through the white room's gloom. "He was always such a nice little kid... But he Woke up, and the Primarchs played such a dirty trick. He was the first to fall into their deal- and he gave up everything out of fear."

"What did he give?"

"His emotions."

And Courtney knows exactly why this boy looks familiar.

"That boy- my guide!"

"The Primarchs told him that his future would be clouded by illusions. He signed away his emotions, what he thought would be the cause, only to discover his ability was illusions. And he couldn't even be angry about it." Mike looked up at Courtney sadly.

"You met him. My little brother."

And when Mike leaves, he does so with a grim face and tear-tracks. Courtney falls back upon the bed, more determined than before to sleep.

To Wake.

-:-

The Primarchs are nothing more than white shadows seated on marble thrones in a cold, gold filigree room. Their booming laughter hurts as she approaches.

"Child!" The leader roars with laughter, "Arrogant and bossy! What is your virtue?"

And Courtney replies that she doesn't know.

"Weakness shall be your strength child!" A woman's voice cackles like a fire to her right, "We know your weakness!"

"What will you pay for your power?"

Courtney looks to the faceless gods, her steely determination clear in ever fiber of her being. She speaks her answer, confident and clear.

-:-

Courtney Wakes.


End file.
